Why Men Behave Badly: Causality vs. Morality

" ...many men are goats and can't help committing adultery when they get a chance; whereas there are numbers of men who, by temperament, can keep their purity and let an opportunity go by if the woman lacks attractiveness." -- Mark Twain

Many of the recent discussions about "men behaving badly" have been confounded by attempts to simultaneously understand the phenomenon and condemn it. But like oil and water, causality and morality don't mix well.

Often our first response to behavior we dislike is: I don't care why it happens. I just want it to be punished and to stop! Sometimes our moral outrage shuts down cool headed attempts to understand the causality of behavior. However, as pointed out by fellow evolutionary psychologist and PT blogger Michael Price in his recent post, if we wish to reduce behavior that we find morally objectionable, having an accurate understanding of why it occurs is an essential first step.

And sometimes we confuse immorality with psychological abnormality. We often label people as sick who act immorally (often they are not). Moral objections to homosexuality led to its classification as a psychological disorder only a few decades ago (it is not so classified now). As our cultural moral sentiments change over time, so too do some of our conceptions about what is, or is not, psychologically abnormal.

Another factor that bedevils our attempts to understand "men behaving badly"is our tendency to project our own motivations and beliefs on to others. Or, in the words of the anthropologist Donald Symons, we tend to "construct other minds is our own." When we are puzzled by someone's actions, we may often ask ourselves, Well, why would I do something like that? A thin person may have difficulty understanding the gustatory appetites of someone who is overweight, and may think that the naïve suggestion to "just eat less" is actually helpful. Heterosexuals have difficulty conceiving the sexual attractions of homosexuals, and vice versa. And, men and women have notorious difficulties understanding each others' sexual motivations and intentions.

Let me suggest that when it comes to the opposite sex, "constructing other minds as our own" can be a very bad idea. It can lead to mistaken conclusions about their motives and intentions. Why? Because the brains/minds of men and women can operate quite differently when it comes to sex. Most males can understand the motivations of men who succumb to sexual temptation, even if they do not do so themselves. Even faithful President Carter admitted: "I've looked on a lot of women with lust... I've committed adultery in my heart many times."

Women may have more difficulty understanding men's sexual motives (and, vice versa). This is especially true if they try to understand men by "constructing the mind of the opposite sex as their own." For example, some women have wondered aloud: Why would Tiger Woods want other women when he had a beautiful, young wife at home? Most men, however, find his motivations less confounding.

So, for now, let's leave aside both considerations of morality, and also curb our tendency to project our own perspectives on to the opposite sex.

Our most basic desires and aversions are remnant adaptations of what worked in the ancestral past to increase the likelihood of reproduction. We are the psychological fossils of our ancestors. And, reproductively, what worked for males could be a ticket to reproductive oblivion for females, and vice versa.

Below are some (brutally honest) evolutionary reasons why men have sexually dimorphic psychological adaptations that can make resisting sexual temptation a bit of a challenge, even if they are in a satisfying relationship.

1. Because men have a faster rate of reproduction compared to women, they are generally more easily sexually aroused and are more indiscriminate about sexual partners.

Human males can reproduce very quickly and at very little cost.

In contrast, ancestral women bore a very heavy cost to reproduce – nine months of gestation, 3 to 4 years of lactation, and a decade or more of socialization. From a male perspective sex is fun, free, consumes calories, and can be a way to get to know each other a little better. On the other hand, for ancestral women the consequences of sex could be anything but free. By consenting to sex, an ancestral woman was consenting to the possibility of pregnancyby that particular man (who may or may not be able or willing to invest paternally), and she was consuming one of her precious opportunities to reproduce during a limited fertility time window. Wonder why women today are generally more sexually choosy and discriminating than men?

In contrast, men can literally walk away from a bad mating. They can literally be in another state tomorrow pursuing new reproductive opportunities. As a consequence, men generally tend to be far more sexually indiscriminate and eager than women. The setpoint for their reproductive libido is generally higher than it is for women.

Sometimes women complain that men are not willing to commit. Men are willing to commit... to as many fertile women as possible. It is not the commitment that is a problem for men, it is the commitment to limit his reproductive output to that of a woman. In the "best" of circumstances, men have a potentially much greater reproductive output (see my previous post on this topic). Men are polygynists by nature. Because this is illegal in our culture, some men change their reproductive strategy from simultaneous polygyny to serial monogamy (or to "monogamy" with affairs on the side).

Keep in mind that these are not conscious reproductive calculations being made by each gender. Instead, they are evolved psychological adaptations that operate at unconscious levels that generate motivation and desire. We don't choose to have the motives and desires that we have, nor do we know the ultimate reasons about why we have them. We just feel them.

2. Men are aroused by the prospect of sexual partner novelty in itself (the "Coolidge Effect").

The Coolidge Effect is the well documented phenomena of mammalian male sexual re-arousal when a novel sexual partner is introduced. For example, when a cow is placed in a pen with a bull, he will typically copulate with her, but he will soon stop. However, keep replacing the cow with a novel one, and the bull will continue to copulate with each new female, virtually until exhaustion. Why? Because each new female represents a new reproductive opportunity -- another chance to impregnate a female and thus increase his reproductive output.

The President and Mrs. Coolidge were being shown [separately] around an experimental government farm. When [Mrs. Coolidge] came to the chicken yard she noticed that a rooster was mating very frequently. She asked the attendant how often that happened and was told, "Dozens of times each day." Mrs. Coolidge said, "Tell that to the President when he comes by." Upon being told, President asked, "Same hen every time?" The reply was, "Oh, no, Mr. President, a different hen every time." President: "Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge."

So human males are generally sexually aroused by sexual partner novelty per se. Men's magazines like Playboy and Penthouse offer pictures of novel females each month. But, come on. Once you have seen a couple of naked ladies, don't men get the general idea? Additional naked ladies are just variations on a theme, right? Do men have such a short memory span that they need to be re-reminded each month of the contours of the female form? No, it is the pure novelty of a new naked woman that they haven't seen before that is of interest. Ever seen a men's magazine that has had the same woman as the pin-up month after month?

Mistresses of Tiger Woods calendar

The sheer number of Tiger Woods' mistresses almost tests the limits of sexual partner novelty. Here is a portion of a "Tiger Wood's Mistresses Calendar," with one of his mistresses pictured each month.

Of course, this male interest in sexual partner variety does not bode will for long term monogamous relationships.

3. Men are most sexually attracted to women within the age window of maximal fertility (about 17 - 28).

Men of all ages are generally most sexually attracted to women of high fertility. Men can assess fertility visually because a woman's fertility is so highly correlated with her age and health. And, they can assess it very rapidly, and very accurately -- just a fraction of a second glance will do. Women have a "prime high fertility window" for about 15 years or so. Then, after about age 30, the probability of conceiving and bringing a pregnancy to term declines fairly rapidly. Ancestral men who were oblivious to cues of female fertility, or who were most sexually attracted to, say, post-menopausal women, generally did not leave as many descendants behind.

The male desire for sex with highly fertile women militates against the prospect for a life long faithful marriage. To be bluntly honest, as a man's wife ages and her fertility declines, his eyes may start to wander to younger women who are still in their prime reproductive time window. The reproductive value of his wife is depreciating at the very time that his own income, power and status (and thus his attractiveness to other women) may be peaking. As noted above, some men engage in serial monogamy -- but the key point is that they tend to re-marry women who are increasingly younger than themselves. That is, their focus remains on women who are still within their time window of high fertility. To wit: the marriages of Donald Trump.

Paul Newman and wife Joanne Woodward

When I give lectures about this to my classes, I sometimes see a hint of despair in the eyes of some female students. So, I have used the example of the happy 50 year marriage of the late actor Paul Newman and his wife Joanne Woodward to emphasize the fact that men can indeed be faithful. So there is hope, I would say, even if your husband was an extremely good looking and famous movie star who constantly had women throwing themselves at him. Newman was once asked about infidelity, and he replied: "Why go out for a hamburger when you have steak at home?"

Unfortunately, I won't be able to use this example in the future. A recently published biography revealed that Newman was not a faithful husband throughout his long marriage. It was apparently well known in Hollywood that he had an affair with the journalist Nancy Bacon. The joke among the Hollywood insiders was that "Paul may not go out for hamburger, but he sure goes out for Bacon."

Journalist Nancy Bacon, mistress of Paul Newman

4. Powerful, high status men are generally more attractive to women, and thus they have more sexual opportunities and temptations.

"A man is as faithful as his options." -- Chris Rock.

It is often suggested that powerful men feel entitled to what they want, and so they take it. Although that may be true, it is also true that often they don't have to go looking for trouble. Instead, trouble comes looking for them. Rock stars have groupies who take the initiative, as do many sports heroes (such as Tiger Woods). President Clinton didn't go after Monica Lewinsky, she came on to him by hiking her skirt and flashing her panties from behind. High status men are less likely to be faithful simply because they have more opportunities presented to them by women.

Men like Arnold Schwarzenegger are the paragon of high-testosterone alpha males. We reveled and were transfixed by the super-normal stimuli of his steroid enhanced physique, his superhero movie star character, and his political power. We admired him for being high testosterone Arnold, but were later surprised by the other behavioral effects of that hormone, which includes Arnold's increased levels of appetitive sexual desire.

This presents an ironic Catch 22 for women. The men that women generally most desire -- powerful, high status men -- are the very men who are the least likely to remain faithful to their wives. A man's income level and the probability that he will be unfaithful is almost a perfect linear correlation. If a woman wants a faithful husband, she would do better to marry a taxi driver than a surgeon.

5. Men are interested in "low cost" sexual opportunities.

Men can simultaneously pursue two different reproductive strategies: a high investment relationship with his wife and children, and a low investment sexual affair with women who are willing. It is the low investment sexual affairs that can be particularly appealing to men (and often particularly upsetting to women). Here is one example where "constructing other minds as one's own" can be particularly painful to a wife who has discovered her husband's infidelity. Since women are more inclined to have a "high investment" affair that involves an emotional connection, by projection she may over-estimate her husband's degree of emotional involvement with the other woman. Because men pursue low investment sex, it may actually be quite low. It came as a shock to some of Tiger Woods' mistresses to discover that he had no intention of leaving his wife. Nancy Bacon terminated her affair with Paul Newman when she realized that he was committed to his wife and family and was not going to leave them for her.

6. "Meaningless" sex can be quite meaningful to men.

"Sex without love is a meaningless experience, but as far as meaningless experiences go its pretty damn good." -- Woody Allen

Sometimes women say they cannot understand how men can have sex with strangers, prostitutes, or with someone that they do not love. How can that be meaningful? Well, it depends on the meaning of meaningful. Again, from a male perspective, there was little downside for ancestral men when an opportunity presented itself to have low investment sex with a fertile woman. As a consequence, as noted by Woody Allen, a quick fling can be pretty meaningful to a male.

Think about it this way. A woman is reassured of her own reproductive value to the opposite sex every month with her ovulatory cycle. When is a man reassured of his reproductive value to women? When he has sex. In addition, one of the most meaningful experiences a woman has in her life is when she gives birth. Men never experience that. The closest men come to giving birth (and the meaning associated with reproduction), is sex. After sex men usually feel pretty good about it -- their self-esteem is generally increased and they rarely experience "post-copulatory regret." The song "I Just Had Sex" by The Lonely Planet exemplifies this post-copulatory male elation.

7. Our modular minds make hypocrites of all of us.

As Robert Kurzban pointed out in his book Why Everyone (Else) Is a Hypocrite, our minds are composed of a multitude of emotional, motivational and cognitive modules, each of which operates somewhat independently. Often they are in conflict, with one module telling us to do one thing, and another telling us to do the opposite. No wonder we often experience internal conflicts. Elliott Spitzer was prosecuting prostitutes while simultaneously patronizing them. There have been many preachers who have told their flock to be faithful to their spouse, while they were simultaneously engaging in an affair.

Solutions?

Now we have a better understanding of why men behave badly from an ultimate, evolutionary perspective. For more proximate explanations (how the brain works and the effects of hormones), see this post by Susan Reynolds and this post by John Buri.

Now, let us turn to issues of what we think should be -- issues of morality.

First, let's keep in mind that understanding the causality of something doesn't morally justify it (that error is what is called the "naturalistic fallacy" -- the erroneous idea that if something is natural it must be good). But we also need to beware of the "moralistic fallacy" -- the idea that the world simply can't work in a way that is immoral (the erroneous idea that the way the world ought to be is the way that it must be).

Given "men behaving badly," should we try to change men's sexuality -- try to socialize them to reduce their inherent tendencies that we find problematic or immoral? Should unfaithful men be given "interventions," such as sexual rehab? Should past legal penalties for adultery be reinstated? Perhaps if we make the penalties sufficiently costly, men may think more with the head above their shoulders?

Or, alternatively, should we change our culture? Europeans, especially the French, seem far more accepting of the affairs of powerful men. In some cultures it is accepted that a man may have a mistress, as long as the affair remains rather covert and it does not negatively affect his family.

Perhaps there are alternative, simulation activities that could satisfy men's primal impulses, but without the negative effects? One successful non-sexual example is team sports. Team sports mimics a truly immoral and horrific aspect of human nature, the "thrill" of in- vs. out- group tribal warfare. Team sports manage to successfully simulate this human propensity for tribal warfare such that we can experience the primal thrill of victory (or, the agony of defeat), but without anyone actually getting killed.

Can alternative simulations effectively subsitute for men's inclinations toward sexual partner novelty? Say, via virtual sex (pornography) and/or short-term commercial sex (prostitution)? There is evidence that when these have been legalized in various countries, rates of sexual assault have generally declined thereafter. Might they also cause a decrease in the rates of male marital infidelity? To my knowledge, there have been no studies that have assessed this.

Or, in the future, will increasingly life-like virtual reality, or even life-like robotic sexual partners (such as those in the film Westworld), allow men to effectively satiate their sexual desires for multiple novel beautiful partners, without negatively affecting their real world relationship? Sounds creepy, I know. But, who knows what the future may bring.

Finally, lest we bash too much on males, what about "women behaving badly?"

Women too can behave badly, but often they do so to satisfy a somewhat different set of underlying motives and desires. I will explore this in a future post. But, here is a stunning statistic to contemplate in the meantime. DNA testing suggests that, on average, the percentage of children with a biological father who is actually someone other than the man so identified by the mother is stunningly high: as many as about 10%. Look at the people around you. With that rate of cuckoldry this is not just a rhetorical question: "Who's your daddy?"

So, along with men, "women behaving badly," for their own unique reasons, should also give us moral pause.

Recommended for further information:

Post by David P. Schmitt on correlates of infidelity, and this post by Laura Betzig on the history of powerful men and their mistresses, and this post by Michael Price re male sexual risk taking.

Not sure I buy this 'evolution makes us do it' argument.
Of course we are animals but, unlike other animals, we have self-awareness, an ability to predict the consequences of actions and an ability to plan for the future in a complex way.
Evolution and animal nature favour the strong and eliminate the weak but I don't hear too many arguments supporting the elimination of the handicapped, the old, the terminally ill.
And by the way, I'm not sure that I would ever have promoted Paul Newman as a paragon of fidelity, considering that his relationship with Joanne Woodward started as an affair when he cheated on his wife with whom he had 3 children.

Women lust after men when they're in relationships as well. We just don't blab about it. Odd how some studies have been published asserting that men AND women are, contrary to popular belief, both wired to be promiscuous... Women do many of the same things, which, although I do acknowledge that men and women are obviously very different, leads me to believe that maybe we're not as different as we think...

One point though--apparently the cuckoldry rate overall is not 10%, it's 3.7%

Of course, the rate varies (income is a good predictor of this variation), and in some areas DNA tests have revealed it's as high as 30% (very low income areas in the US for example).

3.7% is the overall rate I believe, which is nothing to scoff at. That's over a million men in the United States unknowingly raising a child that's not their own. So much for the canard that contraceptives obviate the cuckoldry risk.

If they did, is that because only women's work ensured their survival?

Or did men work for those children in a more general way?

If so, why would they do that if they were then providing for the children of other men?

Evolution is about the survival of offspring.

Where did their parental investment come from?

Why do so many women let men exploit them?

Shouldn't we also note that this behavior has not been selected because it leads to male 'well-being'? Male sexual behavior tends to reduce male health and happiness - think of the antechinus as an extreme, but generally it is about stress and health problems. It is the genes that benefit but the body is often sacrificed in the process.

How many different partners do we think the average male in the past had?

With a 50:50 sex ratio, that means that the average woman had exactly the same number of different partners as the average man.

What would the reproductive fitness be of the men and the women along the range of numbers of different sex partners?

A man would have to have a lot of sex with his 'casual' sex partners to hit the target of a fertile egg, so it is not likely to be a very successful reproductive strategy. And if the offspring does not get much in the way of parental investment to make up for his absence, then it is a poorer outcome still.

Presumably, women who are more easily deceived by men are reproductive losers?

Finally, throughout evolution offspring do best when their parents are sexually monogamous. It is sexual monogamy that means the interests of the two sexes converge so the toxic effects of sexual selection are reduced and relations between the sexes are the best they can be.

Surely one of the problems we have re. sex is that we have not yet acknowledged that from an evolutionary perspective, sex is full of self-interest and exploitation and pain - even death (of other males, offspring, and sometimes females). Until we get past the idea that sex=pleasure and well-being we'll get nowhere.

Only it was never ever 50:50 ratio, that's sort of modern phenomenon (and still you'll see quite a bit higher level (several times higher I think of male virgins in their 20s 30's 40s ). Only something like 40% of males historically reproduced, leaving other 60% to fight wars in a "winner take all" type of thing. Quite a few women would rather be a 3rd 4th wife if it was legally allowed, to a high status male than be exclusive to a low status male.

Lots of earnest questions there, maybe later I'll come back and give a proper response, this has gotta be rushed. Couple of misconceptions in there--monogamy is very rare in nature. For example, only about 3% of primates are sexually monogamous, likewise with mammals in general, and contrary to common belief, these 3% are monogamous for reasons that have nothing to do with biparental care--biparental care and monogamy evolved separately; they are not connected.

Offspring from casual sex survive often because the woman's tribe would help out, including other men who may use parental care (for kids who are not their own) as a mating tactic. The human story is one of polygyny and serial monogamy.

"Male sexual behavior tends to reduce male health and happiness".

There's a point of diminishing returns, sure, but evolution doesn't give a damn; the job is to spread the seed far and wide. Evolution wires up the male brain to find sex pleasurable, because statistically this should get the job done, even though often it won't lead to successful fertilisations; the male doesn't care--from his proximate vantage point it's about sexual pleasure not impregnation.

To speak of the "average" number of sex partners in males is misleading, because male reproductive success is not distributed the same as women's--there's far greater variance. A small group of men at the top of the hierarchy get a disproportionate amount of females, and many men don't get to mate at all. In contrast, most females will mate and pass on the DNA. So, even though the average numbers are the same (of sex partners), it's misleading to come up with an "average" number of sex partners of the average male. You need to look at medians, modes, standard deviations, etc.

"the male doesn't care--from his proximate vantage point it's about sexual pleasure not impregnation." Sure, then do us all a favour, boys, wear condoms (or better yet, fancy a vasectomy) and don't reproduce, there's already enough bad seed in the genes pool.

I know social monogamy is rare, and sexual monogamy rarer still. Social monogamy is about 17% in primates.
But I was referring to, for example, the experiments on fruit flies where sexual monogamy was imposed and the sperm became less toxic to the females, the males became far less aggressive towards females, and offspring numbers increased.

We are not naturally sexually monogamous but in evolutionary terms it is an 'ideal' in terms of reducing the harmful consequences of sexual selection and sexual conflict - and it benefits offspring.

Social monogamy probably arose due to mate-guarding, with preventing infanticide by males being one of the reasons.
Sexual monogamy is the consequence of both sexes successfully mate-guarding partners who will mate outside the pair for their different benefits if they get the chance.

The human story, as well as open polygyny and serial monogamy also includes less open polyandry - females are not naturally monogamous either.

We also have empathy and compassion which for many of us means that we choose monogamy because we can feel for our partner - when we know that 'selfish genes' are using us for their own ends and the pleasure easily turns to misery, that helps too ;)

If the woman's tribe will provide for her offspring anyway, why is she at all interested in having one mate?
Are you saying the tribe will comprise both wives and prostitutes?
Won't girls be married at puberty and then remain married or have a succession of husbands?
Do you think women impregnated by a male deceiving them into casual sex will have then lived as unmarried prostitutes in our EEA?

Wouldn't all women past puberty be married? So the only casual sex a man could have would be with another man's wife? Isn't she then polyandrous?

If males have sex for pleasure, why do females have sex?

There is greater variance in males in number of fertilizations but there is also more variance between females than presumed because of what happens between fertiization and sexual maturity.Infanticide by mothers will also reduce the male fitness due to deceitful casual sex and cut the mothers costs.

Depending on the situation females will use different strategies, from staying sexually faithful to one reliable male who is a good provider to having sex with multiple men and getting some resources from each, presumably while still married.

The modern world with vast numbers of unmarried and childless young women is a novel situation which maybe sends the male's mate-seeking radar a bit crazy to say the least :)

Sex and Searching for Children Among the Aka Foragers and Ngandu Farmers of Central Africa Hewlett & Hewlett
is probably a lot more realistic.

So when do we just throw in the towel and give up on men? This is exactly why I have a fear of marriage.

Is there also evolutionary evidence that fathers are not important to children? If they are important to the well being of their offspring then why isn't there some sort of biological process that makes them more loyal and committed to their families?

I know how to resist my urges to cheat, and I know how to focus on the man I'm in love with and disregard others. I think men have just historically been held to lesser moral standards. (I know there are women who cheat to, but I am pretty certain there is a higher rate among men).

Thank you for writing such an interesting essay. Perhaps it is a bit ahead of its time.

I recently wrote the following in my blog:

“…For many men the three most fundamental motivations behind everything they do are money, sex and power. Different men are motivated to different degrees by each of these motivations i.e. some men are highly motivated by wealth, some by power and some by sex, leading many women to conclude that “all men are all the same”. Of course, the three lend to each other. These motivations have a tendency to destabilise societies – already we are seeing a reaction to too much wealth being in the hands of too few people and most societies tend to frown upon polygamous relationships. Historically, providing for a family or social group has satisfied these motivations of man.

The most fundamental motivations of many women are different and have a tendency to stabilise society, these are: security, love and family/tribe/community. Here ‘love’ implies a ‘personal experience of emotional proximity’ that is manifest not just in romantic love but also in respect, understanding and initiative. I have grouped family, tribe and community together as these all represent a common social circle connected by history…”

I find the sense of despair in some of the above comments quite curious; after all, this is not just about men and their behaviour but also about women and theirs. Just because women tend not to seek affairs does not mean they are off the hook – societies say that extra-marital affairs are wrong but are largely quiet about the burgeoning global population – it’s certainly not men who are having the babies.
I especially liked the author’s observation that women assume men think like women and men assume women think like men. Despite society’s attempts to homogenise our attitudes to gender and equality we are still, so far as our thought processes are concerned, very different animals. For women it seems that sex is associated with all manner of complex emotions and attachments. Ask any man what he can remember 10 seconds after orgasm and you might be surprised at the paucity of information. Perhaps that’s an evolutionary trick to keep men spreading their genetic material far and wide – we are given the desire but not the memory.

The only advice I can offer the despairing females out there is: make sure you control the money (men are as profligate with money as they are with their sexual discretion), but make sure you give him just enough to have some fun.

This may be difficult for many to accept but for a man, having sex (with whoever) is just as emotionally significant as a family gathering (with children, grand-parents, aunties and uncles) is for a woman. Of course, society says the family is good and affairs are bad but this leaves man’s fundamental desire marginalised and, in some societies, repressed. And that’s not going to work out well for anyone.

Another one of those essentialist view of complex behaviours as biologically related to sex. The thing is that you can't separate how these instinct operate, from the social settings. Depending on the context human women can even be polyandric, it's well known.

So, women are not biologically wired to have multiple partners? Dream on, boi. Infidelity is a kick in the balls because men are usually oh-so-not-careful-and-not-caring about choosing their partner in crime and can drag back home a colourful bouquet of STDs. Women are more careful in choosing their strays. I strongly dislike when such childish naive biased opinions are being showed down our throats as being the explanation and justification of something both sexes should compromise to, however in such "essays" it's completely justified that men cheat and women are assumed not to have such needs (and those women who do are bad bad bad). Eff.

If men are pre-disposed 2 promiscuity, is that why natural lack of skill re: female orgasm? Never meant to care that much?We should just be stoked they don't actually eat the cubs like adult, male, Grizzly Bears?

i liked and fell for guy 4 years he was short guy he seem like such knight shinning amour but few years research .he was not as sweet as he let on like most men .
because he only fancies big chested blonds and love porno actress and strippers nice guy or what .
no morals what so ever .very selfish and very shallow very clinical look at women feeling without emotional being analyzed like robot height .size ,weight, face ,age , crushing the numbers to see if she worth knowing or not .men are complete robots self absorbed assholes

Not ironic at all how you really broadly categorized all short men (suppose to be sweet/in debt because they are unworthy? ) and then once it didn't fit your narrative you expand definition of all men being self absorbed assholes. Based on one guy, and perhaps if you weren't so self-absorbed you could have picked up on his shallowness before you even started dating him.

this short guy i like for years i did not date him he doesn,t give me time of day .because he looking trophy woman hot blond with super white teeth ,skinny ,huge boobs ,fake tan ,long nails he doesn,t want woman with a personality or intelligence either
just hot blond trophy .i don,t paint all short guys the same way just this particular one . he wants woman like that to show off his mates that he scored beyond his league at his short height .

I think you might have dodged a bullet then,myself and most hetero men could care less of what others think about their "type". I knew some guys like what you describe, and they showed sociopathic tendencies, not just when it comes to women. Yeah, and one of them turned out to be gay, so take what you will from that.

i am beginning to his true shallow colours.i was under impression at 1st he liked smart ,active women but from i obversation of facebook and twitter its seem have love big busty blonds like jenna jameson etc or any hot blond with huge boobs you get picture .even i do like him .he short guy he have smaller pool of women to choose from. so why he picking women who completely not available to him . keeps hoping one these women will see him as perfect guy for her .i am confused .that makes no sense

The idea of "investment" completely fails when you consider homosexuality. Lesbian relationships preclude any "investment" and yet, lesbians do not go out and have vast amounts of anonymous, casual sex in the absence of this threat. In addition, if it is "hard-wired" then all men would behave like this to some degree or another, which isn't the case. I grew up with a guy who, by no moral or religious compulsion, has only had two sexual partners (and this is at age 30). -- And no, he's not unattractive such that he couldn't get a date. Meanwhile, I know a girl who has literally screwed her way across Europe as well as the Northeastern United States. If this really is some sort of biological compulsion, wouldn't these individuals be just a little bit closer to it?

This may not be able to be put in striking, emotionally-charged headlines like this article, but: people are people. The factual support for that is more plentiful than for this emotionally-charged argument. We're diverse, and there are men who cheat, want lots of sexual partners, and have no interest in intimacy...there are also women who are the same...there are women who are interested in settling down, having a deep, committed relationship...and there are men like this too. Your theory applies only to a subset of humanity, and the standard deviation for differences in a species isn't so vast to account for your margin of error.

What ever happened to "choice"? Some people choose -- not just to do things "wrong" but to decide that they have no choice in the matter. This very acknowledgment of choice is the very foundation of self-control and self-moderation -- because if you don't acknowledge the option, be the reason intellectual, psychological, or biological, then you literally can't do things otherwise. Why don't you make a study on that? On what the difference is between people who decide to choose and take control of themselves, versus people who decide they have no choice and submit to their impulses? That would be a lot better than just blaming biology, when that clearly doesn't explain things.

"Once you have seen a couple of naked ladies, don't men get the general idea? Additional naked ladies are just variations on a theme, right? Do men have such a short memory span that they need to be re-reminded each month of the contours of the female form? No, it is the pure novelty of a new naked woman that they haven't seen before that is of interest."
Yes but there's absolutely 0% chance of mating with those women, so what's the point?

And why do women throw themselves at high-status men? Surely they didn't think Tiger Woods was going to have a long term relationship with them did they? Same goes for fantasy knight in shining armor romance books. Also disney/rom coms, men aren't the only ones deluding themselves.

Ehm, those models and actress are also high status, although you could argue that such high status come directly from their beauty, especially in the case of models.
But famous actors are generally also conventionally attractive, although older on average, but not always so much. I don't think most women control their account or which is most paid.

This does not excuse infidelity, for a man nor a woman! If you can't keep it in your pants, or keep your legs crossed, you have no business getting married or staying married!

Those vows you make and promises you swore to uphold in front of God and to eachother were meant as a solem oath, pledge and token! If your not willing to forsake all others and want to be selfish and self centered and promiscuous and risk your own health contracting STDs, then you should remain single and not risk the health of your spouse!

You should have NEVER married if you knew you could not be faithful! If you do stray then DIVORCE! If your tempted BACK AWAY and remove yourself from all temptation!

THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR CHEATING ON A SPOUSE THEN LYING AND DECEIVING!! WRONG!!

I married an alpha male who did not want kids and had never produced any. He told me he was proud that all five pregnancies he had caused ended in abortions. He thought that many of the world's problems are caused by over- population. Before we were married, I got pregnant with another man's child and he seemed happy to raise it, but was also fine with me terminating it. Thoughts?

I also have high testosterone. I never wanted to get married because I thought I would get bored having sex with the same person. By age forty though, all my girlfriends were married and it got more difficult to have short affairs with interesting good looking men. (I guess most of them had gotten married too.) So I got married. I think I probably shouldn't have. I should have kept playing the field. I only wish there was a way to control oxytocin bonding. Uhrg, it is my achilles heel.

I wonder if women had the same guarantee of orgasm that men do during sex, we might be just as promiscuous. Historically, sex has not been that great for women - think of "close your eyes and think of England". Orgasm is the reward ... it's that intense pleasure that keeps men (or women) coming back for more. But its only been quite recently where a woman's orgasm was something even considered. From an evolutionary standpoint, there was little in it for women to sleep around. Lets face it, the sexual experience of a man is only about his pleasure, its pretty boring. Not exactly an experience most women would chase. But if she has the same chance to reach orgasm? I think that could turn this evolution theory on its head.

I think another big reason is not wanting to get pregnant. In the days before DNA tests, men were much less likely to be made to pay for the raising of a child, unless they were forced to marry the mother. The women, before birth control, were for the most part, in it for the long haul. And they had to be much more picky about who the sex partner (read: father) was, considering it was much easier to get pregnant.

Even in the sexually free present, where women are able to learn all about the female orgasm and may feel more entitled to one than ever before, there's no gaurantee that she's going to get one from a sexual encounter.

Actually, this is just an excuse - or a collection of excuses - to let men do what they want regardless of anything else, and motivating such behaviour by saying _because it's nature, because we are wired that way_, - hell no. "Men are willing to commit... to as many fertile women as possible." So, it's better to be GAY. As a gay man, you won't be too judged by living the sexually as is stated above _is wired by nature_, and as a gay woman, you don't have to keep on waiting when will the cheating happen. Easy peasy solution. And then wait until a new, smarter, maybe if we listen to this article - more evolved generation will come along, and stop making excuses for the WEAKNESS of men. And women who act that way too (according to this article, that would be against their nature.) Oh man, isn't this article sexist!

Women get pregnant, men don't. So, the marginal cost of sex is higher for women than it is for men. So, we should expect men to be more promiscuous than women just by rational self-interest without needing to bring in evolutionary explanations.